If you value rare Scotch and enjoy British meals, you probably sampled Wes Morton’s cooking when he was the executive chef at AGAINN. But Morton has tucked aside his recipe repertoire to return to the cooking of his Southern roots. As executive chef of Art and Soul on Capitol Hill, Morton now dreams up dishes that reflect the flavors of his childhood favorites.
A native of Abbeville, La., Morton grew up in a large extended family with members who were either cooking or out in a garden picking figs or citrus fruits from their trees; minding cattle, chicken and quail; or out fishing in the nearby coastal waters. “We lived in Low Country,” he says, “with rice fields and sugar cane fields. We always had meat from the town butcher, a friend of my grandfather. My grandfather and uncle did a lot of fishing, which was a big part of our diet.”
